


Songbird

by sapphire2309



Series: season seven [4]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Gen, Mild spoilers for 3x11, Spoilers for 6x06
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-09
Updated: 2015-03-09
Packaged: 2018-05-25 06:47:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6184810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphire2309/pseuds/sapphire2309
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moz retreats to his trailer in the woods.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Songbird

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for Elr's promptfest IX. This has been expanded by 200-ish words.

Moz retreats to his trailer in the woods. It has everything he needs. When he runs out of something, he dives into the stash Neal left him and replaces it. It’s an existence, not a life, and he never thought he’d be reduced to this, but he has been. He is.

There isn't much to do, really, not in New York, not here. Moz may be brilliant, but he's always counted on having a front man, someone to distract the people while he works his magic.

There's no shortage of hopefuls, but replacing Neal just like that would feel cheap. Like Neal didn't mean anything.

Neal meant everything.

He spends his days planning two man cons, from a simple pick-pocketing to an elaborate, multi-layered assault on the Louvre that's almost too much for two. It's not fun, far from it, it's an exercise in futility, because there's no way he can carry out any of these plans, he doesn't trust anyone enough anymore, doesn't trust them not to leave, doesn't trust them not to lodge themselves in his heart.

He used to be so careful with the doors of his heart, what happened?

It's a rhetorical question. He knows exactly what happened. Neal. Neal happened. Moz knocked on his door but he let himself in, that sly little fox. And then, somehow, he managed to sneak in the Suit. Followed by an entire Wardrobe.

And now there may as well not be doors, his heart is like a living room with a fire and an old wooden table laden with too much food for one person. People keep inviting themselves in. He keeps letting them through.

There are so many people in his heart now, but the spot that Neal used to lean against is empty, and now he just feels cold. The fire died. The table emptied. He threw everyone out.

He doesn’t allow nostalgia and foolishness to keep him company for much longer. A month straight is lost somehow in eating out of cans and sleeping in the trailer and lying on the ground, searching the stars for something, anything that will make him want to do something more than just exist.

There’s so much. If he tried to inventory it all, the finished scroll would wrap around his trailer at least seventeen times. But, damn it, Neal has made him picky and he won't settle for anything but the best. Anyone but the best.

There is no other best.

He’s grown immune to daybreak. He used to see it once in a while, used to believe it was worth seeing. But now he sees it too often and most of the time his eyes are closed anyway, even if he isn’t sleeping, because his inventory is too long and stars have sharp edges, who knew. And then dawn breaks, and the beautiful oranges and yellows don't warm his heart till he sees a single bird fly towards him, one whose tender coo he never thought he'd hear again, it echoes unevenly around the scattered trees and _there_ , there's hope again. Just a little smidge of it. Estelle doesn't sing, of course, but she does him one better. She’s carrying a message, and that message makes his heart sing in hesitant, rasping croaks.

_I'm alive._

Only two people know about Estelle. And the other wouldn't ever dream of hurting him like this.

It's real.

It's _real_.

He panics.


End file.
